October 2006 archive

Comment Preview Feature

I added a comment preview feature, courtesy of Il Filosofo. Seems to be working great and wasn’t much trouble to get working. The only problem I’m seeing is that if I click on the W3C XHTML 1.0 link to validate the page, it complains that the page is not valid because no doctype is found. But there is a doctype, and if I view source and then manually paste that in to the W3C form, it validates fine. The only thing different from other pages I validate on here is that the url ends in .php. Does the validator make some kind of assumption when it sees that? My OCD will compel me to figure this out, but my ADD may allow me …

Unbounded Freedom

The billblog pointed me to a new book and blog about Creative Commons licensing, by Rosemary Bechler.

I enjoyed contributing some scattered and rambling observations to discussions here and here. I enjoyed it for the chance to fire off some thoughts, but not so much as a debate. This is one of those debates where people on both sides are pretty well set with what they believe. (As are most debates. Tastes great! Less filling!) We’re all talking and no one is listening.

It occurs to me that for some time I’ve been reading and have been influenced by people with whom I very much agree. Now I’m reading …

Confessions of a Visual Basic Programmer

Originally published in Free Software Magazine, 25 September 2006.

In my first post here at Free Software Magazine, I mentioned that I actually like using Microsoft Windows. People seemed to let this go or find it not worth commenting on, maybe because my goal is to move away from it. Not that I expected rabid opposition. Not at all. GNU/Linux users are well-known for being quite mild and reserved in their opinions. If we must go back to my drug use analogy, it could also be that readers here were supportive of my desire to seek treatment and rehabilitation and didn’t see the need to condemn me for past transgressions. …